The Foundation for Health Smart Consumers' Inspire Program to launch at RCEC

BASKING RIDGE, N.J. — The Foundation for Health Smart Consumers has announced a major expansion of its smoking cessation initiative through the Inspire Program, which will launch at the annual Retail Clinician Education Congress held in May in Las Vegas. The initial phase of Inspire will continue through 2014.

The initiative, led by John Delfs, senior fellow at The Foundation for Health Smart Consumers and primary investigator for the Inspire Continuing Education program, is made possible by a national grant awarded to The Foundation by the Pfizer Independent Grants for Learning & Change and the support of the Smoking Cessation Leadership Center.

The Foundation for Health Smart Consumers currently provides a patient counseling education program for clinicians in retail-based clinics on a wide range of topics, including, but not limited to, smoking cessation. The grant enables the foundation to “significantly” expand the public health effort.

The Inspire Program, which includes the expanded smoking cessation resources, will reach additional nurse practitioners, physician assistants and other healthcare professionals who provide care at retail clinics. A core component of the program is a patient counseling toolkit available to clinicians online to increase the quantity and frequency of smoking cessation interventions in the convenient care setting. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicate that even brief advice from a clinician about smoking cessation can increase quit rates by up to 66%.

The Foundation is implementing the program in collaboration with the Convenient Care Association, the national trade association of companies and healthcare systems that provide consumers with healthcare in retail-based locations, and in cooperation with their member clinic organizations.

“Working together, the CCA and The Foundation for Health Smart Consumers will provide clinicians in retail clinics with access to training and proven tools for smoking cessation through the Inspire program. Our shared goal is to increase clinician confidence and interventions which will lead to more consumers successfully stopping smoking,” stated Tine Hansen-Turton, executive director of the CCA.

The program is commended by Walgreens Take Care Clinics, which operates more than 370 retail clinics within select Walgreens locations. Sandy Ryan, chief nurse practitioner officer, stated, “Take Care Clinics look forward to working in collaboration with the Inspire program by providing outreach to our clinicians and sharing smoking cessation education materials to improve clinician interactions with patients.”

RCEC, sponsored by Drug Store News, is the only educational conference focused solely on the retail clinician. Wayne Bennett, DSN publisher and RCEC conference organizer, added, “RCEC is committed to having the Inspire program offered as a clinical session each year. Our goal is to have retail clinicians understand the importance of — and embrace their role in — smoking cessation because every clinician intervention is progress on the path to smoke-free living.”

“Smoking is a public health issue which affects 1-in-5 adults and also 1-in-5 high school students. We are delighted at this opportunity to work with retail clinicians who, by using the Inspire approach, can save a life with an intervention of three minutes or less. Retail clinicians can have a major impact on reducing illness and increasing quality of life through smoking cessation interventions,” Delfs stated.

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